It's about POWER - Union Busting

“Union busting is a field populated by bullies and built on deceit. A campaign against a union is an assault on individuals and a war on truth. As such, it is a war without honor. The only way to bust a union is to lie, distort, manipulate, threaten, and always, always attack.” – Martin Jay Levitt, 1993, Confessions of a Union Buster

Let's start this off with the truth of what a UNION is. Unions are not a third-party agency employees hired to bargain a contract and represent them like a lawyer or agent. A Union is the employees, the workers on the front line getting the job done. Here is the actual definition of Labor Union, noun "A group of workers who organize within a company for the purpose of protecting their own rights and interests, as well as those of their fellow employees." Pretty straight forward and simple, but yet companies continue to hire union busting firms (i.e... Labor Consultants) to prevent employees from exercising their rights to be a UNION. They do this by spreading misinformation and lies about UNIONS. UNION busting is very profitable industry. These "union avoidance" paid consultants charge upward to $300.00 an hour plus expensive (travel, hotel, per diem) per consultant. All this effort and expense is not to save money or the bottom line. It is about control and POWER. The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) was enacted in 1935 to protect the rights of employees. You have the right to organize a union to negotiate with your employer over your terms and conditions of employment. This includes your right to distribute union literature, wear union buttons t-shirts, or other insignia (except in unusual “special circumstances”), solicit coworkers to sign union authorization cards, and discuss the union with coworkers. Supervisors and managers cannot spy on you (or make it appear that they are doing so), coercively question you, threaten you or bribe you regarding your union activity or the union activities of your co-workers. You can’t be fired, disciplined, demoted, or penalized in any way for engaging in these activities. If you are interested in finding out more on starting a UNION in your workplace, contact us.

Solidarity,

Jimmy Yeager, IAM District 70 Organizer

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